Thu, 22 Feb 2018 07:51:24 +0000
By MUYANI SHINJABALE
Zambia United Local Authorities’ Workers Union (ZULAWU) has assured council workers that they will be paid their January salaries owed to them within this week.
In an interview with the Daily Nation in Ndola, ZULAWU general secretary, Kingsley Zulu explained that the delay in payments of the January salaries was due to computer system failures at the Ministry of Finance.
Mr Zulu noted that funding was already done and payments were supposed to be made in the first week of February, but the system’s failure had led to the delay of payments.
“The Ministry of Local Government and Housing has already done its part as the schedules had already been submitted to the Ministry of Finance.
“We are therefore hoping that within the course of this week salaries should start flowing, Mr Zulu said.
Mr. Zulu stated that the Ministry of Local Government had communicated with all stakeholders over the matter.
He thanked the affected employees for the patience exhibited during the period.
Meanwhile Mr. Zulu said issues that had arisen in 2017 over the revision of rates applicable to children in line with the Madison Funeral Scheme as well as the migration of the council employees to the centralised payroll system had been addressed.
Mr. Zulu said the migration to the centralised payroll system for council employees was going to be done in two phases.
“Firstly, it will commence on a pilot project targeting eight councils which are Kabwe, Chibombo, Chisamba, Luangwa, Kafue, Chilanga, Shibuyunji and Lusaka which will run for the month of February.
“By the end of March, we expect that all councils would have submitted the data, hence, all council employees will have to move to the centralised payroll system,” he stated.
Mr. Zulu said the project was a great milestone because it was only the local government workers that did not have a fixed pay day.
